1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a temporal storing and a conveying of plate shaped members, in which a plurality of plate shaped members are stored one by one and conveyed to a next processing step one by one.
2. Description of the Background Art
A conventionally known apparatus of this type of temporal storing and conveying of plate shaped members has been that in which the plate shaped members are stored by being piled up one on top of the other vertically, and the stored plate shaped members are conveyed to the next processing step by taking out the plate shaped members one by one either from a top of the pile or from a bottom of the pile sequentially.
Here, in the conventional apparatus in which the plate shaped members are taken out one by one from a top of the pile, new plate shaped members cannot be supplied for a temporal storing until all of the already piled plate shaped members are taken out, so that the conveying of the plate shaped members inevitably becomes intermittent.
On the other hand, in the conventional apparatus in which the plate shaped members are taken out one by one from a bottom of the pile, it is possible to take out the already stored plate shaped member from the bottom of the pile while supplying a new plate shaped member to a top of the pile, so that the conveying of the plate shaped members can be made continuous.
However, in this type of the conventional apparatus, the total weight of the piled plate shaped members is exerted onto the plate shaped member at the bottom of the pile, so that it requires a large force to pull out the plate shaped member at the bottom of the pile from the pile for the purpose of conveying the plate shaped member to the next processing step, and there is a possibility of damaging the plate shaped member at a time of pulling it out from the pile. In addition, in a case where the plate shaped members are corrugated cardboards, the corrugation of the corrugated cardboard can be crushed by the total weight to be exerted onto the plate shaped member at the bottom of the pile.
Moreover, in this type of conventional apparatus, in order to supply the new plate shaped member to a top of the pile, it has been necessary to lift up each new plate shaped member to a sufficient height and then drop it on the pile. Consequently, this type of conventional apparatus requires a considerable amount of work for lifting up each new plate shaped member to the sufficient height. In addition, the impact of the dropping each new plate shaped member over the pile can stir up dust on the already piled plate shaped members such that the room in which this type of the conventional apparatus is installed can be made quite dusty.
Furthermore, in either type of the conventional apparatus, it has been impossible to store the plate shaped members in different sizes in random order and sequentially convey these differently sized plate shaped members piled in the random order. It has also been quite impossible in either type of the conventional apparatus for a plate shaped member of a desired size to be thrust between the already stored plate shaped members, or removed from the pile of the already stored plate shaped members.